London's Escape Room Arcade explored — gaming behind locked doors
Replayable mini-games like no others
Escape rooms are everywhere these days. Enigma Quests offers a number of them across its two London locations, but it now has a new offering which turns the concept on its head. Enter the Escape Arcade.
Part escape room, part arcade game you’ll be pushed both physically and mentally, so make sure you’re ready to compete when you turn up. There’s even a live leaderboard showing the best scores of the day for the ultimate bragging rights.
The Escape Arcade is a great experience for adults and kids alike. Grab a team of between two and four and head to Holborn, London for an arcade experience like no other.
Shortlist did, courtesy of Enigma Quests, and here's 7 things to know about the experience...
1. What even is an ‘escape arcade’?
What a good looking question. In short, there are 30 individual rooms spread out across a maze of corridors in a basement under central London. That makes it sound kinda scary - it’s not. It’s well lit, perfectly temperate, and there will be other teams dashing past you looking for an available room.
Behind each one of the identical doors waits a different challenge, and a large light bar above the entrance to each room tells you whether it’s currently occupied (red light) by another team, or available to play (green light). You’ve got 60 minutes to hit as many of the rooms as you can.
2. Be prepared
Challenges range from mental to physical, requiring different skills and senses, so you’ll want to dress accordingly. A comfy pair of trainers is a must, and you’ll want to avoid any heavy clothing. Fortunately, complimentary lockers are available to store bags, coats, jumpers and valuables - allowing you to throw yourself into all the challenges.
You’ll also want to prepare your brain. Each room has a plaque by the door giving you a brief description of the challenge and the skills you’ll need to bring. However, the instructions are light, and it’s not always obvious once you get into a room what needs to be done. Make sure you read the plaque properly before entering a room, and give yourself a second to assess the challenge once inside.
While you may need to run and jump around some of the rooms, none of the challenges require physical force - music to our ears as we’d not hit the gym in quite some time.
3. Who’s keeping score?
Each game lasts five minutes, which means rooms turnover pretty quickly - so if there’s one you particularly want to play and it’s currently engaged you’ll be able to return later in your session.
One of your team will be issued with an RFID wristband which they’ll tap on a reader next to a door to enter a room and start the game. This links the play session to your team, and once inside you’ll see a scoreboard above the door. The aim of each challenge is to score as many points as possible. The better you perform in a room, the higher your score will go.
But remember, once you’ve entered a room you can’t quit. To exit you’ll need to wait until the five minutes of playtime have expired.
4. Feeling confident?
The 30 games are designed for teams of between two and four players, but if you’re looking to be particularly challenged you can opt to take on the Escape Arcade solo.
For some of the games we experienced playing solo would have been possible, such as The Candy Shop, which requires you to put balls through different funnels, while others would have been near-impossible to score well on.
One which springs to mind is Floor is Lava which was easy for four players, but would be extremely challenging for a team of two, let alone a solo player.
5. Striving for greatness
At the end of your hour session it’s time to return to the main desk to find out how you did. Am I going to use this as an opportunity to gloat? You bet I am. We’re told teams of four tend to average around 40,000 points per session, playing between nine and 11 games.
Team Shortlist managed to clock a glorious 102,275 points across 11 games, and that’s with two of the games we played experiencing technical issues which limited our scoring ability.
We did report the issues to a team member who was walking around the corridors, and Enigma added an additional five minutes to our play time to compensate.
6. Cocktails o’clock
After burning a bunch of calories dashing from room to room you’ll be ready for a drink, and the Enigma Quests venue in Holborn has an unexpectedly well-stocked bar with knowledgeable staff capable of creating rather fantastic cocktails.
There’s a bunch of classic and signature cocktails to choose from, while the bartenders are also happy to go off-menu. You don’t tend to find a pisco sour in too many places in London.
For those wanting something else there’s a range of ciders and beers in cans (we’re told a draught tap is coming soon), wine and soft drinks.
7. Sit, chill, play
And there’s plenty of seating and tablets to sit and relax at with your drink, meaning you’re not rushed out of the building. You can take your time and reflect on your scores displayed on the large wall-mounted monitors, seeing how you’ve stacked up against other teams.
Plus, there are a bunch of board games which are freely available to play. And why not spend a bit more time here playing some games when the cocktails are this good!
A 60 minute session in the Escape Arcade is £25 per person, with time slots available to book Monday to Friday between 11am and 8pm (til 9pm on Saturday and Sunday).